The String of Sanity
by all colors but the black
Summary: this is written by the oh-so-wonderful BloodSoakedCutie (also known as Chaxr). Chaxr is letting this be posted here so that everything is in one place. This is the backstory of Xera and explores whether or not a heart is truly necessary


The blood dripped messily, trailing the tangled meat mixed with strands of hair, from the red-stained hand that was twitching furiously. Suddenly, a laugh escaped from above the hand, the mouth open to a sickening unhinged gape, the laugh bubbling and broken. Unshed tears ran down the insides of the cheeks that were pressed aside by the mouth, and finally, the blood settled around the six-year-old girl's shoulders. Her laughing could be heard for the miles of dead vegetation and animal bones protruding from the broken ground. The laugh bounced off into the distance to where only those with the most trained ears could pick it up.

One set of ears that picked up the sound was a slightly pointed pair of ears hidden beneath grey-purple hair and a band of thin cloth that was slung to one side to hide his eye on the other. "So, another's appeared…" He mumbled to himself, scratching himself with his arrow-gun. "That makes two now. I'm sure the 'princess' will be thrilled that we found his only…" He trailed off, walking into the rising sun to find the child that could've produced the noise and destruction.

The girl's eyes darted around, wide and contracted wildly, seeming not quite sure of what had happened. She looked down at her hands, the red seeping between her fingers and to the backs of her hands, splashed up to her-mid arm, just below her elbows. She smiled blankly at the liquid, not seeing what the colour symbolized. She put her hands down and looked around, not seeing what she was looking at. She saw the barren land crackling into the sunlight, the heaps of fur and surprisingly soft-looking white and red combo mixed in. None of it registered. Not the blood, not the smell, not the sun, not the lack of movement, as if the wind were afraid to move near her.

One thing she did notice was the sound of the _crunch_ of a boot coming down heavily on a dried stalk of some unrecognizable plant. She swung around to look at the living intruder.

"Hey, calm down. It's just me." The tall man came noisily over the plants, stepping not around or over, but directly on top of the corpses, squishily expelling more blood from the many lacerations that seemed to appear out of nowhere as if the beast hadn't known it had died until it was dead. "I promise you I won't attack, but even if you attack me, I can promise you I won't die as easy as all these." He swept his hand holding his arrow-gun across the horizon, gesturing towards all the blood now seeping into the parched land.

The girl tried to talk, her mouth moving, but no sounds escaping. The man held up a hand.

"I'm just here to take you back. Not for chit-chat. You're brother's worried sick." He leaned back, looking at the sky solemnly for a second, then burst out laughing. "Aw, who are we kidding!? He could've sent you out here to die for all we know!" He held his sides with a free hand, shaking and his shoulders rising as he leaned over from the force of his laughter. The girl looked at him, confused, and the edges of unshed tears collected just under her eyelids. "Hey, don't give me that look." He looked up to the small figure, trembling now in the almost complete sunrise. Her white hair was stained from tip to root with red, only the lightest hint of white giving way to her real colour.

The man stood up properly, his face serious now and scratched behind his head again, resting his other hand on his hip. "Look," he said slowly, his good eye closed as he walked over to the small figure, then squatted in front of her. "I may not be the best at taking care of kids, but how about if your brother really is the asshole I know him to be and ditched you out here, I'll be your family? I won't be your brother or anything, I'm too old for that…" He trailed off, scratching his head again, his awkward nature suddenly seeping through under the intense gaze of the child. "Tell ya what, kiddo; I'll be your cousin!" He put a finger to her nose, the glove rubbing softly the bloodied skin. "Yeah, your cousin…That should work." He nodded to himself, then got back up to his full height. As soon as he did so, though, he felt a tug on the very edge of his coat, gentle but insistent. He looked down; the girl was holding on to a fistful of cloth, ready to hold on for as long as his attention would.

She put up her arms, indicated wanting to be picked up. The man smirked. He picked her up just under her arms and placed her roughly onto his shoulders.

"Well, let's see, I'm Xigbar. If I remember right, your bro called you…"

"Xera."

"Yes, brother?"

"Would you at least look at me when I'm addressing you?"

Xera dragged her gaze away from the delicate script of Latin on her blades, lazily rolling her eyes up to meet the fiery orange eyes and steely hair of her twin; Xemnas. While they were the same age, his position was far greater than hers, and she resented him for leaving her to rot at such a young age. Despite the hate that swelled between them, she could never completely hate him. He was the only true flesh and blood that she knew she shared with anyone in the world, and despite wanting to more often than not, she couldn't just hate him, forget him, and move on with her teenage angst.

"_Yes_, brother?" He cleared his throat, an uncomfortable edge sinking into his eyes until he blinked it away quickly. She simply stared at him with her piercing, too-seeing eyes.

"The hearts are slacking. I want you to head the next mission with Lexaeus. He should be able to stop you if you get too out of control."

"Why am I always clean-up crew for you and your hearts? And send Xigbar with me. Lex may be able to stop me, but he can't make me change back. Xig can." She spoke calmly, as if discussing something that didn't have to do with killing a few hundred in the very few hours she was allowed out of the Castle every month.

Again Xemnas cleared his throat, his eyes darting away from hers, nodding minutely. "Fine. You tell him."

"Will do." She threw her blade slightly into the air, catching it expertly by the handle, slashing it around, looking only at it and not at her brother as she left the meeting room.

"Hey, Xig, we gotta go out and satisfy my bro's asshole-ish desire for a heart." Xera came up behind Xigbar, pushing his head slightly forward, waking him if he'd been asleep.

"Hey, ow, 'kay. Jeez, I'm too old for this. How you feeling today?" He looked back over his shoulder, leaning his arm over the top of the couch, rubbing his head and neck. She looked away, fiddling with the belt strap that held her blades.

"Fine." She said simply, not quite trusting her voice to back her up. She leaned against a wall, waiting for Xigbar to collect himself enough to track down Saix.

"Well, come on, Kiddo; hearts aren't gonna grow themselves." He winked as he passed her by.

"I thought you only called Demy that." She came up beside him, in a slightly hunched over position, leering at him. "Are you implying that I'm on his same level?"

"'Course not, but you and Demy are special, and I can't exactly call you 'Xera,' can I?"

"True," she grinned. "I might try to kill you again." She looked at him, and he was pouting away from her. "Aw, come on, I said sorry!"

"It took my hair forever to grow back…" he muttered. Xera simply grinned apologetically.

"Just make sure I don't try that again today. I mean, that is kinda up to you." She grinned more mischievously. He glanced at her, then smirked to himself.

"Well, at least you should enjoy today's mission. I'd heard a couple days ago that a new world cropped up and the recon says there's plenty of space and darkness to wander around in."

"Ooh, nice, so I'll get to stretch without having to worry about the blood staining the light. Sounds fun."

"Doesn't it? There was one thing that recon brought back that you probably won't be too thrilled about, though." She looked at him cautiously.

"Oh yeah? And what's that…?"

"Uhm, well…" He scratched the back of his head before mumbling incoherently, "I think it was…"

"Goddamn SPIDERS! Scum of the world of exoskeletal creatures! Die, all of you!" The blade slashed through the dull black cephalothorax, tearing the great beast in half before it puffed into a black cloud that held a pink gem of a heart. "Hardly worth it! The disgusting, wretched, and might I mention, GIANT monstrosities! Why do you have to exist? Why couldn't you have evolved into, like, a butterfly, or an iridescent beetle, or a firefly, or a dragonfly, or even a stinking ladybug! Something other than your current form! Quickly! Curl up in a cocoon and make your legs and eyes and celicera and palps and your stupid spider self fall apart and just turn into a butterfly!"

"Xera! Calm down! Focus on the mission."

"What do you think I'm doing?! I'm killing the nasties _and_ filling out my heartless quota!"

"You're at risk. I can feel your sanity's string."

"Whatever! Let it snap! I'm not gonna let these damn things live!" She continued to slash with her Latin blades, snipping off legs and palps in her long sweeps, leaving her victims immobile until she turned back to crush what was left of their head with her boots. "Yuck! That was stupid…! Now I've got spider brains on my laces! That'll take forever to wash out!" She shook her boots, her ties sloppily dripping, then puffing in black smoke. "Oh, yeah…" She looked down, wide-eyed, then continued crushing the outer shells of the heartless' heads.

After the imminent threat of spider was taken care of, Xera leaned back. "Huh, gone back to yarn. That's nice." Xigbar looked at her.

"You're sure you're okay, kid? It was close that time."

"Why do you think _you're_ here, old man? You may not be the best in stitching, but it's your job to tie back my string when it breaks. Hey, do you hear that?" She cocked her head to the side, listening intently. He followed suit, a confused look colouring his left eye.

"Hear what?"

"That music. It's really subtle, but it sounds cool." Xera closed her eyes listening and letting her twitching eyelashes sync with the beat of the music. "I wonder if that beat is what a heart feels like…?" She brought her pale hand up to the spot on her chest where the strange, foreign organ was not. She clenched it, the string suddenly tightening to a pin-point.

"Goddamn it!" She leapt to her feet, stomping away, slashing as another minor heartless jumped out from the shadows. It puffed, and the heart fell and shattered. She looked down at it with distaste for a half second, then stomped over it. "Such weak things…who needs them? Why does my brother…? My brother…"

And there went the string. A quiet, inscrutable _snap_, and the world was gone.

"Well, well. You've decided to join us once again, you lovely insanity," Xigbar muttered from behind her.

"Nice to see you, too," she glared back. "You form of lovely insanity." The Dark Xigbar grinned. His eye now glowed yellow, his eye patch being torn through by gold streaks. "I hate you, Dark."

"Aw, what a lovely nickname. I bet you say that to all the Other Siders." He grinned insanely.

"Piss off." She started to turn away, but suddenly heard the Dark step forward and chuckle true to his name.

"I wonder what would happen to the Light if I died…?" he started his taunt, leering at her with his insane smirk and wild eye.

"You've already tried that, Dark, and each time, you've dreadfully come back, and Xigbar lives. Why don't you just give up?" She eyed him, narrowed and harsh.

"Ah, but what if _he_ dies this time, I mean really dies, not just his Darkness. Not just me; what if _he died_?" She continued to stare at him, now through slits. "Wouldn't that be just great?!" he cried ecstatically. "And even better if he died the same way I did!" He looked at her now; he'd been caught up in his rampage, but now looked only at her, completely motionless, only the corners of his mouth twitching. "Wouldn't it be great if I got _you_ to kill me? To kill _him_? The only person who's ever actually _loved_ you? Wouldn't that be the best?!" He swung out his arms now, the thought seeming to carry them on a wave of demented joy. Xera did not turn, but spoke in a small, heated, angry whisper.

_"Xigbar doesn't _love_ me; he doesn't love anyone or anything, because he can't. No one can. How can you love without a heart?"_

The shadow chuckled. "You've been listening to Xaldin too much, little one. He seems to be the only one who doesn't believe in love without some stupid red organ thudding away in your chest. Tell me, Xera, what would you feel, if you had a pulse? What would you feel other than the dull _thud_ of a pitifully weak chamber that spouts and sucks in the red venom that courses through your body? Tell me, child. Enlighten me. Tell me what the difference would be for my Light? So what if he can't love now? You think that'd change if he suddenly grew something lumpy in his chest?" He laughed, throwing his head back. "You kid yourself. If you really think he doesn't love you, then you're not worth his love, and he will never love you. You're doomed to that fate, no matter what some flawed ticking away in your chest says. You'll live, you'll kill, and you'll die in simple, cold, unfeeling, _heartless_ blood."

Xera gasped, sucking in air as she was face down, looking into the black dirt as she leaned her chest heavily into her knee, her foot planted shakily to the earth, her ankle twitching.

"Xig…bar…" she gasped. He was at her side, leaning down with her, almost touching her back.

"It snapped."

"Yeah, I know…" she gasped again. "Shut up for a second." She gasped until her lungs were properly full, then hoarsely spoke. "Xig…what colour were my eyes?"

"Same colour they always are when your string snaps," he said cautiously.

"Don't mess with me right now, Xig." She glared at him, her mouth closing before she had to open it again to breathe. "Tell me what colour they were." He sighed shakily.

"They were gold. Like a heartless'."


End file.
